Fourth man jailed for drug and firearms conspiracy

A fourth man from Manchester has been jailed at Manchester Crown Court today (Monday 1 July) after his crime groups’ drugs and firearms deals were uncovered by NWROCU detectives when the encrypted communications platform ‘EncroChat’ was taken down by international law enforcement in 2020.

Junnaid Tufail, 24, of Kenmore Road, Northenden pleaded guilty to conspiracy to supply Class A drugs and three counts of conspiracy to sell or transfer prohibited weapons. He was jailed today for 11 years.

Three other members of his crime group were jailed for more than 36 years in April this year.

Asim Tufail, 52, of Kenmore Road, Northenden was found guilty of blackmail, conspiracy to supply Class A and B drugs, conspiracy to sell or transfer prohibited weapons and money laundering. He was jailed for 23 years.

Danny Parmar, 42, of Ashbourne Avenue, Bolton was jailed for 9 years after pleading guilty to two counts of conspiracy to supply Class A and B drugs and conspiracy to sell or transfer prohibited weapons.

Peter Lawler, 53, of Eton Court, Liverpool pleaded guilty to possession with intent to supply Class A drugs and participation in activities of an organised crime group. He was jailed for 4 Years and 4 months.

The crime group’s international drug and firearms empire came crashing down back in 2020 as part of Operation Venetic - an international operation targeting criminals who used a mobile encryption service to try to evade detection.

Detectives uncovered messages between the crime group where they shared pictures of expensive home gyms and discussed selling guns and recovering drug debts.

T/Detective Superintendent Zoe Russo from the NWROCU’s Investigation Team said:

“This brings the total sentencing to 47 years for this crime group who mistakenly thought that they could get away with their crimes by using the encrypted mobile platform EncroChat.

"I hope this outcome demonstrates that the NWROCU is unrelenting in its pursuit of offenders and that we work tirelessly to proactively investigate serious organised crime, including the use of guns and the supply and distribution of drugs in our region."